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Pacific and Indigenous Studies

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Citizens and residents of New Zealand and Australia are recognised as domestic students at the University of Waikato.

If you are not a domestic student, please select the international option below to view content for overseas students.

This subject explores the knowledge, language, culture, politics, methods and theory of Pacific and Indigenous Studies, while teaching students how to interpret new ways of understanding the world.

Pacific and Indigenous Studies focuses on the diverse Pacific region – which covers a third of the earth’s surface and is home to over 1200 languages – as well as on the histories, experiences and perspectives of Pacific people in New Zealand.

Students of Pacific and Indigenous Studies bring a wide range of background knowledge to their studies: from Pacific students who will find their own perspectives are valued and expanded through academic study in this area, all the way through to students who might have little knowledge about the region but bring a desire to learn about where we are.

All students of Pacific and Indigenous Studies learn a lot about the region and where we are, and also practice and develop skills of critical thinking, communication, and analysis of diverse perspectives.

This learning of specific content and skills is underpinned by questions which relate to the people of the Pacific region and the big questions of the 21st century: what does it mean to be human? What is the relationship between knowledge and power? What are the real costs and opportunities related to development, cultural change, and migration? What is the difference between equality and sameness? How do we learn from histories (of greatness and of genocide) in order to shape a better future? What legacy do we want to leave for the 22nd century?

Unlike other New Zealand or regional universities, Pacific Studies at Waikato is paired with Indigenous Studies – because this reflects our approach to the study of the region: Pacific-centred; and guided by the ideas about culture, politics, history, arts, migration and sustainability that underpin Pacific Studies and Indigenous Studies.

Students who major in Pacific and Indigenous Studies at Waikato explore key regional and local issues related to the Pacific through a series of core papers, and also have a chance to focus on areas of their own interest through papers offered by academics working in a wide range of disciplines.

Ever wondered why the 21st century has been described as ‘the Pacific century’?

This course examines Maori, Pacific and Indigenous peoples' philosophies and relationships with land, language, culture, resources, development and political frameworks within settler-colonial states and Pacific nations and others.

This paper introduces students to foundational elements of Pacific Studies, including various histories, languages and cultures and their importance to contemporary societies, surveying a number of Pacific Nations.

200 Level

An anthropological overview of the indigenous cultures of the vast 'Polynesian triangle', from their ancient explorations and settlements, through their engagements with christianity, colonialism and capitalism, to their contemporary societies and diasporas.

This paper explores the relationship between language and culture, particularly in the context of changing Pacific cultures, and relates topics to the main themes of modern linguistics and anthropology.

The paper looks at the detrimental effects that research has historically had on Indigenous peoples and the relatively recent creation of research methodologies by Indigenous peoples to counteract Imperial research, and to empower and decolonise.

This paper looks at the various socio-historic influences on migration in the Pacific and the relationship between Indigenous cultures of origin and diasporic cultures and identities formed in countries such as Aotearoa/New Zealand, Australia and the US.

This paper looks at the key theoretical influences, from Marxism to post-structuralism, upon critical Indigenous studies and the most significant writings by those Indigenous scholars who have chosen to engage with critical theory.

This paper looks at Indigenous epistemological formations of sustainability as one of the most pressing issues for Indigenous peoples particularly in the Pacific, and also as a concept where Indigenous peoples can be prominent in influencing discourses.

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